The present invention relates to toilets, and in particular, toilets for use by males.
FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional toilet 100 that includes a tank 102, a base 104, a bowl 106, a seat 108, and spacers 110. Bowl 106 is capable of holding an amount of water and includes an outlet to discharge the water out from the bowl into pipes connected thereto when toilet 100 flushes. Tank 102 additionally contains an amount of water. When toilet 100 flushes, a portion of the water from tank 102 is discharged from tank 102 to draw the water from bowl 106. After water from bowl 106 is emptied into the pipes connected to bowl 106, another portion of the water from tank 102 is used to refill bowl 106. Tank 102 is then refilled by an external supply of water via piping (not shown).
As illustrated in FIG. 1, when seat 108 is located in the seating use position, spacers 110 rest on bowl 106. In the seating use position, a space 112 is provided where spacers 110 separate seat 108 from bowl 106.
As bowl 106 is designed to receive solid and liquid waste, bowl 106 is conducive to bacterial, viral and fungal growth. Accordingly, water in bowl 106 is typically contaminated.
There are two problems associated with the use of toilet 100 by males.
With respect to the first problem, when an adult male is sitting on toilet 100, there is a chance that the flaccid penis of the adult male will contact the contaminated water in bowl 106 thereby increasing chances of infection. Obviously, this can become a health problem for the adult male using toilet 100. However, there is a chance that a penis that has been infected by contacting contaminated toilet water can pass the infection to others during sexual intercourse and lead to other infections. For example, the contamination, if transferred to a female, could result in a yeast infection.
The second problem deals with urine escaping the toilet when a male is urinating while sitting on the toilet. For example, there are times when the location of the head of the penis is positioned such that during urination, urine flows through space 112 thereby soiling the outside of the toilet and the floor. Typically, in such situations, the male is unaware of the unfortunate positioning of the head of the penis until the urine is seen (or in even less fortunate cases, felt) by the male. There are other times when an erection causes urine to flow over seat 108, which soiling the outside of the toilet and the floor. The conventional method to prevent these situations usually involves waiting for the erection to pass or manually pushing the erect penis so as to point into bowl 106 while urinating.